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Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

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Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#211

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

rbanffy wrote: post #144
pwdisswordfish wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding gaming - Linux went backwards now that new gadgets like VR headsets and high refresh synced monitors are required for serious gaming. Feels like 2002 all over again without any games.

TBH, the hardware manufacturers could write drivers for their stuff.

They might do, if Linux wasn't so hostile to the concept of proprietary drivers and had a stable driver ABI.

Not that I necessarily disagree with their position on the matter, but you can't escape the consequences.

Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#212

Post by rbanffy »

rocky1138 wrote: post #149
rbanffy wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TBH, the hardware manufacturers could write drivers for their stuff.

Or at least write open documentation so free software can do the work.

So that people can do their work for free.

Is writing proper docs so bad not even getting these fine people working for you for free makes it worth the effort?

Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#213

Post by Sir_Cmpwn »

bluedino wrote: post #181

What's the holdup on DE/WM getting hidpi support? It seems like it would be possible to handle it as Macs do, but Linux support for it is just awful. Inconsistencies all over the place. Using multiple monitors can be another pain point. It works for the most part, but full-screen a video on one monitor and you get flashing and artifacts on the others, you'll "lose" a screen, all kinds of weird stuff. And that's Fedor…

It's hard, we're unpaid, and we have to do it in our free time. Consider setting up a recurring donation to desktops you want to support.

Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#214

Post by criddell »

erikbye wrote: post #185
criddell wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows is getting better at high DPI even for non-DPI aware applications. It's weird though. Windows seems to do different things depending on the scaling factor and how you set the factor. 125% might look terrible but 150% is tack sharp. Setting 125% as a custom scale factor does something different than choosing 125% as a standard scale factor. Usually, you have to log out and log back in after changing the scale,…

Yes, I've definitely seen blurry fonts on 125% in some apps. Creators Update and Fall Creators Update both have a lot of scaling fixes and those might help for some of the apps. Have you updated?

Yeah, I'm entirely up to date. I think we are in agreement - Windows 10 does a pretty good job, it just isn't clear to me exactly what it is doing and how the different settings affect the display.

Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#215

Post by rbanffy »

oblio wrote: post #193
rbanffy wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes it is very nice to have 1, 2 or even 5 Laptops which work with linux. It's been a long time I haven't seen a general purpose laptop or desktop that didn't work flawlessly with both Ubuntu and Fedora. The only one I have is the MacBook Pro in front of me, but it comes with a decent OS anyway. > Windows still runs on more devices, better. Can it delete open files now?

> Can it delete open files now? Does it matter? And how is this related to the rest of the discussion? :)

The open-delete-close pattern is common with Unix-like OSs. It makes temporary files invisible and inaccessible to any program that doesn't have them already open at deletion time.

Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#217

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

craigsmansion wrote: post #83
chx wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As another 20+ (24 actually, 0.99pl15) Linux user let me counter: with the Linux subsystem for Windows there's no reason to wrestle with Linux any more. While Linux certainly works on laptops it doesn't work well. Wifi and battery life are absymal and for me seemingly every other update either breaks the printer half or the scanner half of the MFC device (and if not, then it's time for another bluetooth breakage, you…

> there's no reason to wrestle with Linux any more. Unless one wasn't "wrestling" with Linux in the first place, because things tend to just work these days. > While Linux certainly works on laptops it doesn't work well. Wifi and battery life are absymal That's blatantly untrue. Given the right laptop, Linux is on par or excels. Given the wrong laptop, an install from scratch of the Windows operating system is likely…

Your comment doesn't fully implement the Linux Desktop Evangelism playbook.

It's got variations of: "It works for me!" "You chose the wrong hardware!" "Well you can fix that because the source is available!" and "But Windows is worse!"

But it's missing: "Try distribution #132!" "You don't actually want to do that!" and my favorite: "Maybe you're just too stupid to use it!"

Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#218

Post by discordianfish »

I'm using a Dell simply because it's the only option beside Thinkpads that are 'known to work' on current linux distributions. For the Thinkpad I would have had to wait 3 weeks, which again was the only reason for the Dell.

Point is, nobody seems to care about linux desktop users for obvious reasons, being a niche in a shrinking market.

Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#219

Post by purrcat259 »

bitexploder wrote: post #187
luka-birsa wrote: post #6

As a 20 year Linux user I really appreciate Dells support in proving the market exists. This improved support across all manufacturers. I've recently acquired a HP Envy 13 2017 laptop with Windows preinstalled. I've really wanted to try Windows out, but after installing Google Chrome and Docker (1hr after starting it up) it stopped working - windows boot up into a blank black screen. In a hurry I've downloaded Ubuntu…

Agreed. One laptop worth investigating that I haven't seen anyone discussing in this thread is the Precision 7520. It is the same chassis as the XPS 15" laptop, but you can configure it with some more adult options. It is 2017 and I finally own a laptop with 32GiB of ECC(!) RAM. That is pretty damn cool. Allow me to roll out my specs, just cause I love this laptop: * Quad Core Xeon (1505M) * Discrete GPU with accepta…

What laptop make and model is this please? Sounds great. Is the keyboard backlit?

Re: Dell’s gamble on Linux laptops has paid off

#220

Post by bubblethink »

majewsky wrote: post #39
linux-user wrote: post #23

Is Dell still offering those? I cannot find anything. For example this dell page has no current offerings: http://www.dell.com/learn/us/en/555/campaigns/dell-linux-ubu...

Yeah, I'm puzzled as well. Upon reading the article, I tried to find Linux notebooks via their homepage (i.e. by starting at dell.com), but found nothing.

Go to dell.com/developers . Dell's site is quite a disaster in general. It boggles the mind how hard it is for this giant corporations (Dell, Lenovo, HP) to make a halfway usable website.
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